MOSCOW, October 26. /TASS/. Members of the FIFA Council have confirmed that the 2018 World Cup, held at 12 stadiums in 11 cities across Russia this summer, was the best ever in the history of the governing football body, Alexei Sorokin, a member of the FIFA Council, told TASS.
The 8th meeting of the FIFA Council was held on Friday in Kigali, Rwanda, where, according to FIFA "the members of FIFA’s strategic and decision-making body discussed a number of pivotal aspects regarding the future of FIFA competitions."
Russia’s Sorokin served as the director general of the Local Organizing Committee (LOC) Russia-2018 for the FIFA World Cup this year and he is currently involved as the head of the Local Organizing Committee (LOC) Russia-2020 ahead of the UEFA Euro Cup.
"We have been provided with a very detailed report," Sorokin said in an interview with TASS. "Colin Smith [FIFA Chief Competitions and Events Officer] delivered a fact-based report, I also came up with the summary of the event and made an announcement, which was more of a general and emotional character."
"On the whole, this [2018] World Cup was unanimously acknowledged to be the most successful in all possible aspects and the best one in the history," Sorokin said. "All of this was mentioned in the final report, which had been endorsed by the Council."
"In many aspects, we have surpassed records of the previous World Cup editions," he said. "Our initiatives were acknowledged as successful, including the free-of-charge transportation, Fan-IDs and other innovations."
This summer, Russia hosted its first-ever FIFA World Cup, which kicked off in Moscow with a remarkable opening show at the Luzhniki Stadium on the evening of June 14 and ended with a spectacular final match, played also at the Luzhniki Stadium, where France confidently defeated Croatia 4-2 to win the much-coveted World Cup Trophy.
The country selected 11 host cities as the venues for the matches of the 2018 World Cup and they were in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Sochi, Kazan, Saransk, Kaliningrad, Volgograd, Rostov-on-Don, Nizhny Novgorod, Yekaterinburg and Samara. Two of the hosting stadiums were located in the Russian capital.
The national football team of hosts Russia managed to make it to the quarterfinals stage of this world championship, where Croatia edged them out on a 4-3 penalty shootout win on July 7 at the Fisht Arena in Sochi.